The Tories know they screwed up some stuff - but there is one glaring omission

There's an obvious question for Conservatives to answer, three months on from their historic election defeat - what went wrong?

The party's annual conference in Birmingham this week - the first in which it has been out of power in 15 years - has been dominated by the race to replace Rishi Sunak as leader. But it's also been an opportunity for the party to reflect on mistakes made in government.

The honesty has been refreshing. On Sunday (September 29), Tees Valley mayor Ben Houchen - the most powerful Conservative in the north, and perhaps in the country - said that his party were 'absolutely terrible', 'incompetent' and lost the trust of the British people.

READ MORE: We asked every Conservative leadership candidate one question about the North

He praised the party for promising 'exactly the right thing' under Boris Johnson in 2019, but accused the previous government of failing to 'level up' the country. Others on the same panel - including former government minister Mel Stride - identified 'competence' over migration, the NHS and the economy, trust, citing partygate, and a lack of economic growth since 2008, as causes of their downfall.

Meanwhile, Michael Gove - who served in the government for 13 of the last 14 years - described Liz Truss's mini-budget in 2022 as 'flawed', despite defending her intentions. The ex-Prime Minister, however, claimed that she would have won if she stayed in power.

But there is one thing that some Tories still seem to be in deniable about - their broken promises over transport in the North. It comes exactly one year after the Manchester leg of HS2 was cancelled, meaning that the multi-billion pound project will not reach the North.

The £36bn saved by scrapping the scheme would be re-invested in other transport projects, Mr Sunak promised as he announced the cancellation of Phase 2. More money would also be made available for Northern Powerhouse Rail - an east-west line across the region.

Public transport within cities, not least in Greater Manchester, did receive a boost from the Conservative government which gave Andy Burnham the power to take control of buses with a package of £1bn given to the mayor to go along with it. But after 14 years in power, despite promises to connect cities across the region and create a 'Northern Powerhouse', there's nearly nothing to show for it.

And it seems as though some senior Conservatives have not learnt from their mistakes. On Monday (September 30), Lord Moylan, who is a transport spokesperson for the Tories, seemed to suggest that the North does not have enough people to warrant rail investment.

The next day, he rowed back, claiming this comments had been misrepresented. He told the Manchester Evening News that the North needs 'more imaginative thinking' when making its case, arguing that the region is not 'entitled' to investment in public transport.

Speaking at another event later that day, shadow transport secretary Helen Whately told an audience that she has appointed a shadow minister for 'transport in the North'. She said that she hopes this sends a signal about how important she thinks that is.

But when asked by the M.E.N. whether creating this role in opposition, rather than when they were in power, is an acknowledgement that they did not focus enough or deliver in this area while in government, she defended the Tories' record. She said: "I think no.

"I think if you look at the track record of us in government, there was a huge amount of investment and attention given to transport north of London and in the north, to the extent that I know as a South East MP, my constituents say, what about us? It's all about levelling up and all about the North?

"I don't see that, I just thought it would be particularly helpful in my shadow ministerial team to have somebody who was particularly focusing on that and a member of Parliament whose constituency is in the North and living Northern transport connections daily."

There was some contrition, however, from a former Conservative MP. Iain Stewart, who chaired the transport select committee, told the M.E.N. that cancelling HS2 in the North was a mistake and urged the new Labour government to look at alternative plans now.

He said: "I wasn't happy when that decision was made. But I wasn't leader of the party - it wasn't my call to make.

"I knew there were concerns for a long time about the cost for HS2 - a genuine question was, the HS2 budget was starting to take over so much of the transport budget that it was crowding out other investments that other people wanted to see.

"I think the answer was to not just see if they carry on with HS2 as it was and just let it keep spending money, but say, okay, we might need to refocus it, rechange the parameters of it, but still have it. I think there was a better way of doing that.

"So I would have made a different decision had I been in charge - but I wasn't."

The former Milton Keynes South MP, who lost his seat in July, went further, arguing that cancelling Phase 2 of HS2 undermines the case for other rail projects in the North, including the new line from Manchester to Liverpool. He said: "I think the two co-existed.

"If you look particularly at the tunnelling options in and around Manchester, they were going to serve a dual purpose. Cancelling one does undermine the case into another.

"This report that's come out, I'm not saying that that's the perfect solution, but I think it's an important contribution to the debate."

He added: "My main message to the new Labour government - and it's a point that Lord Moylan made - this needs to be a cross-party, infrastructure view of what we do with infrastructure in this country. The investments go way beyond the normal political cycles - four, five years between elections.

"These are multi-generational projects that will be in place for decades, hundreds of years. That does require a consensus."